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Topic: The SAT Disadvantage score (Read 1918 times)

The reality is that colleges/universities COLLECTIVELY cover a wide spectrum of student.Perhaps for 15% of all students, the school you went to, and it's 'standards' matter. For the remaining 85%, it's that you WENT TO school; 3-5 years after graduation, students hired primarily on what they have done with their diploma/certificate (experience), not where they got it from, or how it was delivered (in-class/on-line).

Within academia, the SAT score is just a filter that enables a pricing strategy.Skim the market. The 'guild's' appoach of taking the highest scores only, keeping the annual intake small, charging a high price for graduate 'quality' & 'rarity', and restricting supply, to back the 'value' of the diploma. Ivy league approach.Go for volume. Take lower scores to maximize 'butts on seats', volume discount prices, don't restrict supply, and rely on what graduates do with their certificates 3-5 years down the line. Community college approach.

The underlying premise is give ALL bunnies a roughly equal chance at an education.Then let them either drop out, or graduate, as 'life' changes them while they are attending your college/university.

While a college/university may prefer to cull hard, and early, society typically objects.Moms don't appreciate their little Suzie's in tears because they failed, couldn't handle the stress, or didn't get their 'fantasy' grade....... even if little Suzie is as thick as a plank.

Obviously not the best approach, but ultimately we will get what we asked for.

This AM there was yet ANOTHER article of the rot & corruption in the Edukation Industrial Complex.

Turns out the "well to do" are gaming the system yet again for their progeny. Apparently there are tons and tons and tons of well to do students who are learning disabled and need extra time for their tests. Check it out at:

Saw that, not sure what the right answer is, but kids who have families that can pay for test prep/go to better schools etc. are clearly at an advantage. When I was a kid my parents didn't even know what the SAT was, I studied for it by checking out an old prep book from the library, while I worked a part time job bagging groceries. I did well enough to get into college, but I had no chance vs the people who were in the know about the stakes of it and had the money to prepare, given the same intelligence. So I'm not sure how comparable our scores were. I bet there are enough people out there who are pretty smart, but just don't have the resources to prepare, which is skewing the results enough that they have decided to do this.

People who study more will get a higher SAT score? Well ya, you don't have to tell me that. But don't taint the result just because it is not a perfect indication of ability. It is like saying you can subtract 20lbs from your weight when you apply to go to the army because you were born in a disadvantaged socioeconomic class.

Saw that, not sure what the right answer is, but kids who have families that can pay for test prep/go to better schools etc. are clearly at an advantage. When I was a kid my parents didn't even know what the SAT was, I studied for it by checking out an old prep book from the library, while I worked a part time job bagging groceries. I did well enough to get into college, but I had no chance vs the people who were in the know about the stakes of it and had the money to prepare, given the same intelligence. So I'm not sure how comparable our scores were. I bet there are enough people out there who are pretty smart, but just don't have the resources to prepare, which is skewing the results enough that they have decided to do this.

People who study more will get a higher SAT score? Well ya, you don't have to tell me that. But don't taint the result just because it is not a perfect indication of ability. It is like saying you can subtract 20lbs from your weight when you apply to go to the army because you were born in a disadvantaged socioeconomic class.

Saw that, not sure what the right answer is, but kids who have families that can pay for test prep/go to better schools etc. are clearly at an advantage. When I was a kid my parents didn't even know what the SAT was, I studied for it by checking out an old prep book from the library, while I worked a part time job bagging groceries. I did well enough to get into college, but I had no chance vs the people who were in the know about the stakes of it and had the money to prepare, given the same intelligence. So I'm not sure how comparable our scores were. I bet there are enough people out there who are pretty smart, but just don't have the resources to prepare, which is skewing the results enough that they have decided to do this.

People who study more will get a higher SAT score? Well ya, you don't have to tell me that. But don't taint the result just because it is not a perfect indication of ability. It is like saying you can subtract 20lbs from your weight when you apply to go to the army because you were born in a disadvantaged socioeconomic class.

I think that the ACT and SAT & such are ROUGH guides as to intelligence. A person who is marginally retarded is not going to get a perfect or close to perfect score no matter HOW much coaching/studying/preparing is done.

Somebody with a 105 or 110 IQ and at least a moderate education is most certainly going to be able to score MORE points with coaching/practice tests/studying.

One of the problems with this testing & higher education in general is that there is all sorts of craziness going on in the Edukation Industrial Complex. You've got minorities & other economically disadvantaged areas with simply horrendous education. A great example of that is Detroit. Generations of minority children have been sold down the river by politicians to get the edukators support & votes.

Then you've got grade inflation...

Then you've got bribery to get kids into select skools...

Then you've got a whole industry of test preparation and practice. No doubt this is "gaming" the system. Question is by how much?

Then you've got gaming of the testing by having your child declared "learning disabled" in order to get longer time & other favorable testing conditions.

Then you've got scandal after scandal of insane amounts of capital being wasted in primary education.

With all of these problems being known, what is else is out there going on that we do not know of?

The whole system needs drastic reform. This is really critical, because without adequate education, things will fall apart pretty quick!

All a society need do, is essentially make public college and university education 'free' (means test); a common occurrence in much of Europe. The student effectively invests just their time & opportunity cost (forfeited full time income); as living costs were already going to be paid, whether or not the student went to school. The student is still free to master in art history over 4-5 years, but is not going to invest the time unless he/she is passionate about it (& arguably not a bad thing).

Sadly though it is far too radical an approach for NA.Society is just not there yet.